Thanks to Islay and Annonymous

Nice to know I have more lifeguards.

I really appreciate the experience of gay men who comment on this blog. And Islay, it was really good to hear from a contemporary teenager who did not come out fully to him herself at age 12.

I hear so much about how much younger kids are coming out, and the other three boys had all come out to friends and social workers, at least, before coming to me, so Frankie is a new experience. I should go on the record saying that I do not believed I have answered his quesitons for him. Frankie is not here because he is believed to be a closeted gay boy; he is here because people believe he needs a safe place to figure things out for himself.

The only thing that Frankie currently identifies as is a Druid.

And, as I seem to be saying quite a bit lately, that's okay too.

Frankie, The Boys, and First Allowance

Frankie and Brian have been getting along like a house afire (that's a metaphor for "well" right?)

They both have "social awkwardness" that seems to integrate just fine. Brian has been teaching Frankie how to play the various video games, and Frankie has been an eager pupil. David, who was here last night, commented that it looked like Brian finally got the younger brother he always wanted. (For those who have not memorized every detail of my children's biographies, Frankie is 15 and Brian is 13, but like I said, Frankie feels 10).

Anyway, I drove to the city yesterday to fetch David to spend some time with us. When I got him home I told him that he was 80% there because I missed him; 10% there because he and Frankie should meet each other; and 10% there so that Frankie would know that we liked gay people, even if they weren't ... you know ... more "butch" than Hubby.

David laughed and said, "Yeah, Evan and I are sort on opposite ends of the scale, aren't we?"

I said that I would not say opposite, but definitely different. David said he did not mind being an exhibit. Frankie did not interact with him much, but that's okay. Afterwards Hubby asked me if Frankie had been told that David was gay. I'm afraid I said, "No. But he met him. And then there is that prom picture of him and his ex-boyfriend on the mantle in the living room." (They are so adorable in their coordinating tuxes. If I posted photos it would have a permanent home on the front page.)

We gave Frankie his first allowance, waiting until this morning so that Hubby would be able to say "yes" when Frankie asked if he could go shopping right away. They went to a couple of different stores. Frankie bought 3 skeins of yarn that do not match in color, weight, or texture, along with a set of crochet hooks so that he can crochet an "afghanistan." He also got a Nerf gun. He wanted the semi-automatic one, but could only afford the ... whatever it was. He looked at rings at one store and has said that with his next allowance he wants to get a ring and more darts for the gun.

This kid has, I'm proud to report, absolutely no respect for gender stereotypes.

When they got out of the van Frankie saw the PFLAG bumper sticker and wanted to know what that meant. Hubby told him that it stood for "Parents, Family and Friends of Lesbians and Gays" and that "we have a lot of gay people in our family." He said that Frankie's eyes darted around nervously, but he didn't say anything.

Hubby didn't say anything either, allowing Frankie to change the subject.

Before I met him I had trouble believing that a fifteen-year-old boy in 2007 could not be out to himself. He might appear to be questioning, but surely he was just questioning the safety of coming out to others. Now that I am getting to know him though I have no trouble at all with the thought that he is still in the self-discovery process.

And that is okay too.

More On Granny

This is written with Granny's permission.

I am getting emails from friends of Granny who don't want to bother her by asking "what happenned." Granny deleted the details of the event from her blog to protect the girls from negative local attention, but I don't think that is a danger with my blog. So I will share the bare bones here.

When I go to a training, everyone shares what sort of care they do, and we nod. We are not easily impressed, afterall we all do foster care. But when a family says, "We take teenage girls" there is gasp and then sounds of amazement and wonder. Teenage girls are the most difficult.

Well, one of Ann's teenage girls got angry and called CPS. Stupid stunt. The girl in question made charges that are simply absurd, but CPS came out and investigated.

The investigation led to conversations with Ann about how much she has on her plate and what work the landlord should have done on the apartment and hasn't. Ann's sons encouraged her to retire. It was okay to just be the grandma, and let the girls live somewhere else.

Ann is of course beyond sad, even if she agrees that this is the right thing.

But as always, Ann is thinking of the girls first. She took the story off of her blog because she doesn't want local people giving them grief for calling CPS.

Like I said, Ann was my first friend on the Internet. She is a PFLAG mom. She has been raising her great-grandchildren because that was what was best for them, and now she is letting them go because it is what is best for them.

It hurts, but I am hopeful that once things settle, Ann will enjoy being able to take care of just herself and Ray and get to be the GRANDMA! (Actually make that GREAT GRANDMA).

Ann's phone number: 209 230 3354

Abandonment

I emailed my counselor, the one I saw when Evan revealed his addiction and who helped me so much for more than a year. She helped me really work through all that stuff with my father. She really made a difference for me.

And in the spring we decided it was time for me to stop coming all the time, but that if I ever needed to come back I could.

And it was sort of weird because she said something in our last appointment that sort of rubbed me the wrong way and I wanted to go back and say "WTF"? Because for over a year she hadn't said anything that was hurtful and so I must have misunderstood, or something. Surely she wasn't really expressing disappointment in my progress fifteen minutes after agreeing I was ready to stop seeing her.

And she is really professional about that rule where you are not supposed to confuse the therapeutic relationship with friendship, and I was really awkward about how to talk to her afterwards, which was unfair and strange because I know that Evan emails her and keeps her up on his life and feels completely relaxed about it -- and she enjoys the emails. I on the other hand felt weird and avoided her (which would have been easy except that Andrew sees a counselor in the same practice.) But I had been thinking about going and seeing her again, to work out feeling weird about not seeing her, you know?

But that isn't why I emailed her. I emailed her to see if she thought she would be a good person to see Frankie or if she would refer me to one. I sort of hoped she would see him because then I would get to talk to her about him and it would be more relaxed.

And she emailed me back and said she was moving far, far away, back to the place she came from.

Typing this is making me feel a little better, really it has, but I feel so abandoned.

She said I could always come back and now she is going away. It really doesn't feel fair. She was supposed to be there. I could always go back. She was supposed to be this anchor line, and now she is going away.

And I know that she would tell me that if I am feeling this this strongly I should think about what I am re-feeling. What childhood abandonment feelings are coming back. And that is so easy to figure out I know I don't even have to talk to her about it to do it.

And I should use this space to talk sympathetically about the traumatized kids we take care of. I mean, if I have it pretty good and have been in a safe and loving relationship for more than 20 years and I can still be triggered into feeling like an abandoned little girl, then how much more difficult it must be for them? My counselor, whom I am not even seeing anymore, is moving across the country. It is not about me, it is an entirely reasonable action on her part, and I do not feel the least bit reasonable about it.

But writing this helps.

Love to Granny

Granny was the first person to ever comment on my blog. She was the first other blogger that I emailed. She was my first friend here in cyberspace.

And now she is going through a difficult time. She has had a hard year, or more.

If you know her, stop by and give some love. She deserves it.

Botched Registration

Well, we messed up.

New student registration ended at noon. We went in right after lunch.

We got to see his transcript for the first time. He has completed one semester of high school. I don't know, and can't find out until Monday whether the school even offers the second semester of English, Pre-Algebra, and US History1 in the fall term.

If they don't, than that would be another reason to consider the Alternative High.

I have a head ache. It isn't a problem that I can solve. Hubby is on it.

I'm going to try to think about something else entirely.

Developmental Age

I hope that I am not seeming worried about Frankie's child-like behaviors. Well, I was a bit concerned about the time-telling thing, and I appreciate everyone reassuring me on that score.

I am not generally worried about Frankie, concerned that we find the right educational environment for him, not but generally worried.

Frankie is a sweet kid. I am used to teenagers who are street-smart, tough, and parentified. You know, sixteen going on thirty. These kids are younger than they want to admit, but they put up a good front. Their attitude says, "I'll accept a limited amount of parenting from you because it's the price of living here, but I don't really need it."

Carl, when he first moved in, seemed to be a cross between a 16-year-old and a younger child. He had 16-year-old friends and an "I'm too old for a parent" attitude. He also enjoyed playing with Andrew, who was then 11. There was a difference though. Carl seemed like a 16-year-old who was periodically "going back" and enjoying some of the things that he missed.

Frankie however seems like ... well, like a perfectly normal 10-year-old boy. I walked by his room on my way to mine and heard him playing with his Lego creations making those machine noises kids make when they play with toy vehicles and robots. He is so unself-consciously excited about what he has taught his Furby to do. He doesn't seem like a 15-year-old playing 10-year-old games. He just seems 10.

I want to go out and buy him the big box of crayons. I bet he never got the big box -- especially with all the crayons new and pointy.

It makes sense that he would be about age 10 in some ways. Though his life was far from perfect prior to that age, that was when it became truly bizarre. Once it stopped being too strange for words, he was into care and then group homes. So he missed being age 10.

But that is okay. It is fun having a little boy in the house again. I expect he will go through the developmental stages more quickly. In other words, in a year I expect he will be closer to 15 than to 11, but I don't know. In any case, the whole point of being here is to let him be himself.

I also wonder if being a little kid is protecting him from dealing with the issues that his pubescence forces on him. That though is okay too. One of my favorite therapists told me once that denial is a good thing: it keeps us from feeling or thinking about things we are not ready to feel or think about.

Frankie will grow up when he is ready and feels safe enough to do it.

In the meantime I might just go buy that box of crayons.

Off to school registration

Thanks everyone for the reassurance on telling-time issue.

Frankie woke up early this morning and was playing with legos when I got up. He was described as young for his age before we met him, and that is certainly part of what is going on. Part of it also could be never having seen so many legos at one time. And I imagine that it has been a long time since he has been able to play with a cool toy without a lot of competition from other kids.

And if I have his history right, and I seem to get slightly different versions of it, his prime Bionicle building years were mostly spent living homeless. So this would have been an undreamed of luxury. These aren't regular brick legos, by the way. These are legos intended to build cool, lanky robots which have been disassembled and now may be reassembled to create marvelous creatures. He has spent hours alternating between building these creatures and caring for his furby. He still hasn't got the thing to tell him its name. He could reset it, but it has been played with an has already learned a good bit of English and Frankie does not seem to want to reset it.

There are mulitiple explanations for his interest in activities usually more appropriate to younger children. It could be because he missed those years. I have begun to wonder if it is a way of refusing to deal with his sexuality issues (although that is just a guess).

Today we talk to the study skills teacher. I keep writing long posts with all the options and why we prefer high school with Study Skills class to either "sink or swim" or Special Education: Extreme Edition or even Alternative High School (although I am open to that option). But then I delete them because we don't have all the information and explaining it based upon the what I do know would mean giving you more information about Frankie's past than seems right.

In any case, today we talk with the study skills woman, whom Hubby and I both would like to marry and raise babies with (she's that good). Hubby is also setting up a meeting of all the educational people to make a decision. This committee has the power to give us what we want, even if documentation is incomplete. I plan on keeping my mouth shut and let Hubby do the talking.

The social worker is trying to be helpful, but failing miserably. She sent us an email yesterday saying she had spoke with someone from the next district over and they have a new cool program that is first-come-first-serve and maybe we should check it out. I read it to Hubby and we debated whether we should even tell the SW all about the hoops one must jump through in order to enroll one's child out-of-district, especially THAT district. We decided to stick with the hoops we have already lined up.

In any case, things are calm here now.

I really do plan on bringing David home for dinner. I think that driving him home for dinner instead of taking us all out to eat is less expensive, but with the price of gas it is a bit of a toss up.
Now I just need to get out of my night gown and get ready to go to registration.

Day One, Continued.

Well, he has been here for a couple of hours. He's been pretty busy. He sorted through all the boxes of things from storage. He now has a pile to toss (too small), to store for winter, and to use right now. He found his poker set, and sorted his Legos. Now he is on the Internet trying to learn how to communicate with the Furby his sister gave him.

He is definitely young for his age (15). During the clothing sort he worked independently, quickly, not wanting any interference, but then demanding my attention (not impolitely) to look at a t-shirt. "We all got this for volunteering!" He waits a moment for my response of "Oh. Neat." Then he tosses back into his pile and and continues to sort without telling me who the "we" were and what the volunteer project was. In any case, my attention is no longer required.

Brian brought up his box of Bionicles (a Legos product) and Frankie has been totally absorbed by them. He is content in Brian's bedroom (Frankie's for the week) playing with the toys.

When he gets his allowance he wants to "go downtown" and buy more Furbies so that they can all talk together. He hasn't realized yet that Our Small Town is too small to have a place that sells Furbies. For that we would have to go to the Next Town Over.


I told him we would need to do an inventory of his clothes to find out how many new things he needed. With any of the other boys this would be a cue to tell me how little they owned that was fit for respectable company. Frankie said, "I have like 100 pairs of pants." After a bit of discussion he decides that maybe he doesn't have 100, but definitely enough to last him a couple of weeks.

David called. We were going to have him come over for dinner tonight, but I told him that I thought I should not let Frankie get over-stimulated and we re-scheduled for tomorrow.

[He just asked me what time it is. "Ten to Three" I say. "Ten o'clock?" "No. Ten to three." "Does that mean ten o'clock?" "No it means that it is almost three o'clock." Odd. Did he have trouble hearing me, or does he not understand what "ten to three" means?]

Day One

I probably won't publish this for a while, but I thought it would keep me busy.

9:01am
Currently it is one minute past the earliest time that Frankie might have arrived. That estimate of course was based upon the unlikely assumptions that: Frankie was ready to leave at the outrageously early time that the social worker was picking him up and that they made good time on the highway.

I swept the kitchen and tidied the bathroom. I am debating whether to vacuum. Of course it needs to be vacuumed. It always needs to be vacuumed.

The person who is bringing him is the state worker, which is why I feel like I should make the house tidy. First (and maybe only) impressions and all that. Not that he would take Frankie away if it were a mess.

This may sound like I am obsessing, but really I'm just trying to avoid vacuuming. It is now 9:13...see it worked.

10:05
Still not here. I got Brian up and out of bed. I stripped his bed, put the sheets in the washer, put Frankie's quilt on the bed, vacuumed (not well), wrote a couple of emails and read blogs. Sigh. I'll go see if the dishwasher is done running...

10:30
Frankie calls from social workers phone. They are just around the corner.

10:45
Social worker calls having missed the turn and is trying to figure out how to get back. I gave him turn by turn directions.

11:00ish
They arrive. Frankie has boxes and boxes and suitcases and suitcases. Much of it has been in storage. My suggestion that he not sort until after he gets his room is not so much dismissed as completely ignored. He rummages through things, showing me pieces of clothing and telling me where he got them. He wants to know if we can clean the manure of the boots that have been in storage for two years. The social worker meanwhile wants to talk to me about meds and such. I got the family chart, status of relationships. The social worker gives me his email. He hasn't been a case worker very long (this I learn later in the conversation) and would like me to copy him on email updates to the agency worker.

And we're off!

Count down continues...

So he comes tomorrow morning.

Outside I am the picture of calm.

Inside my thoughts are running around like little mice.

Really, I am looking forward to getting to know a real child rather than having anxious hypothetical thoughts about a hypothetical child.

Really.

Frankie and School

Frankie is coming here tomorrow because Friday is the day that new students get registered at Our Small Town High.

Though we will register him as a regular new student, we really are not certain about schooling for him. It's a problem because he has been in on-site education programs for a couple of years. They don't need to do the sort of testing and paper work that a public school is required to do to justify special ed and other support services, so we don't know what testing was done, whether an IEP was ever written, whether he has a learning disability, nada.

The social workers have been asking the last public school he went to to send information, but have not received a response (not even been told whether there is anything to be sent). Hubby, being a special ed teacher himself, knows the secret handshake and is on the case. It is all rather complicated and though I can talk sensibly about all sorts of things, I do not entirely understand what Hubby is asking for. I do know that he is rolling his eyes when hearing that the social workers are just calling the main office. Instead he is calling the special education teacher and saying things like, "Hey Bob! This is [Yondalla's Hubby] from ____ School. I believe you had a kid named Frankie there a couple of years ago. Do you have a thingamajig on him? Did you do the whatchamacallits? Can you send that over to me? Thanks."

Hubby still doesn't know if they have all the thingamajigs, whatchamacallits, and do hickeys required to justify services, but he is on the case.

This is what I know: We do have an Alternative High School in town and their educational approach is most similar to what Frankie has been in. It is also small (under 100 students) which will feel much safer to a kid who has been in facilities smaller than that. However, they do not have special education services. Getting Frankie in there would require a meeting and they would have to decide whether to accept him. Exactly what their criteria are is a bit of a mystery to me.

The regular high school has a fantastic special ed teacher who provides really good services and if Frankie qualifies for them then sending him there, even though it is a school of over 1000 students, might be the best option.

With the documentation that we have so far, it will be difficult to justify doing anything other than signing him up as a regular student at the huge school and seeing how he does. No one who knows Frankie thinks this is a good idea, but if it weren't for Hubby I would think it was almost certainly what would be done.

But like I said, Hubby knows the secret handshake. So we shall see.

I feel the need to go on record and say that I am less certain that Frankie is going to make it here than I was with the other boys. The other boys were flowers that had been transplanted from someone else's garden into mine. My garden was a little bit better for them than the last one, and they were already weather-toughened plants. Frankie though has been carefully tended in a greenhouse. He has been cared for, or at least supervised, 24/7 hours a day by adults who work in shifts and show up clean, ready for their shift, and pre-caffeinated (if needed). He has gone to school in a single room with kids he lives with and worked at his own pace on all subjects with a specially trained teacher.

We are now taking this hot-house flower and putting him in my garden. He will live with adults who are showing up, not rested and ready for work, but tired from work and hoping for a chance to unwind. He will have caretakers who say, "Please, just wait until I get breakfast and have my first cup of tea."

And we have no idea what school will look like for him.

So though I agree he is ready to try living in a family and I agree we are the right family for him to try living with, I also know that he is not just moving from one family to another. He has been living for years in institutions of various sorts.

This is going to be a big change for him. We will see how he does.

__
side note: "thingamajigs," "whatchamacallits," and "do hickeys" are in Blogger's spell checker, but "caffeinated" and "Blogger's" are not.

40ish hours and counting

Frankie is due to arrive at approximately 9:00am Thursday.

Of course this means his social worker is picking him up long before I will even be awake, but I guess that is his decision. I hope he (Frankie, not the social worker) is able to get some sleep in the car.

Hear Ye! Hear Ye! Hear Ye!

Evan has a started a blog!

I'm not supposed to read it until after he has moved out. I will try, but that is rather like putting out box of chocolates and telling me that I cannot eat them for two weeks. So you will simply have to read it for me. Go tell him his auntie says hello. I had him sign up for a tracking service, so he will know exactly how many people go to his blog from mine. Don't let me down.

Apparently on MySp*ce this is called "whoring him out." I guess that makes me his pimp?Unsettling thought.

BTW: I will keep this post on the top of the blog for a while. Look for new posts below it. [Thanks to FosterAbba for instructions.]

Un-Update on Frankie

When I got home with Andrew I got a message from Hubby Darling.

It went something like this: "Frankie is coming Thursday, not Friday."

"That's what I told the worker I preferred. What time on Thursday?"

"I don't know. I told him you know our schedule better than I do."

"Okay. Is he going to call back?"

"I gave him your cell number."

"Was it the same guy -- the mental health worker -- or was it the state case worker?"

"I don't know."

Great. If I get any real news I will be sure to pass it on.

Still no word on school records.

Driving Lessons, and School Decisions, for Andrew Part 4

Well, I haven't blogged about teaching Andrew to drive for a while. Partly that was because we were on vacation and he of course could not drive the rental car.

Today though he drove us to The City on the freeway. Woo Hoo!

Yesterday was our first near collision. Fortunately he was going very slowly, making a left turn. He was doing a sloppy turn, where you cut across a lane you should not cut across and someone pulled into that space (where they had every right to be and he did not). He did not respond as quickly as he should have and I grabbed the wheel and got us out of danger.

But it was okay. The other car was stopped and we were going less than 10 miles an hour, so even if he had hit the other car, it would not have caused an injury. But it was a good learning experience -- you have to drive around places other cars have a right to be, even if there are not there at the moment.

He did fine on the freeway today. The traffic was light and though I helped him to merge, it wasn't difficult. He did tend to drive closer to the cars in front of him than I would have liked. It turned out he was trying to keep space between him and the car behind him. Once I got that I explained that he really could not control how close the person behind him was going to drive. His responsibility is the amount of space between him and car in front of him.

He wanted to know if I thought he could pass his driving test before school starts next week so that he could drive to school. I don't think so. He knows everything he is supposed to do, and he usually does it, but he does not have the confidence to do well and pass the test.

Still, he is getting closer.

Anyway, the reason for driving to the city was to see his counselor. The main topic for today was school. He made another appointment to talk to the counselor after one week of school, to talk about how it is going.

I'm glad he's doing that. I don't want any repeats of last year's melt down. I don't know what exactly he and the counselor talk about, but I know that Andrew comes out of his sessions more relaxed than when he goes in. We had lunch after and he told me what schedule he is going to start with and what changes he will make if that is too much. Right now he is looking at doing a full-time schedule (6 classes) for the fall and then just 4 or 5 in the spring.

Like I said, I really like this counselor. He is really good and getting Andrew to relax and figure out what he wants to do. Right now he is going for the three AP classes, Pre-calc, Economics, and Marching Band. If it is too much he can either down-grade one of the AP to regular section or drop band and take PE in the spring (Marching Band counts towards the PE requirement).

That's why the visit to the counselor after one week. He can down-grade the AP on his own, just by asking, but dropping Band would require a note from his counselor.

I do think he can handle this schedule. As long as he is doing it because he wants to and is not feeling overwhelmed by everyone else's expectations.

Bad Mom

I've not had a great day. Not a terrible day, just not a great one.

I've mostly been managing all the stress (one kid moving out in 10 days, one moving in in a couple of days, school starting for them and me), but I have had a lot of stress thoughts moving through my head.

Like I am about to have six kids. SIX. I am going to have to write down all their birthdays. I mean, think about that, these are my own kids and I am not confident that I will be able to remember all their birthdays. How does Cindy do it? How does she remember 39 birthdays? Okay, so she only has like 20 at home, right? Or is it 30? Does she bake or buy them all birthday cakes? Do they have a birthday party every other week, or just one a month for whoever happened to be born then? I would ask, but her life is pretty stressful right now and I don't think it is appropriate.

But I've been thinking that maybe six is as many as I can deal with. Kids need attention. They need people to remember their birthdays. A good mom should know what's going on in their lives and I am not that good at remember that many details.

And the doorbell rings.

There is a good mom there. The sort of mom whose kids are take music lessons and are signed up for soccer league and ballet classes. She is here to pick up her son for band practice and will she see me at the ice cream social?

Um...uh...I'm not sure.

She leaves and I call Andrew to the living room. I did not actually yell at him, but I did ask with a fair amount of stress, "What band practice!? Tonight? There's an ice cream social tonight? Is this a fund raiser? Am I supposed to have money, or is it just a social? What do you mean you don't know? Don't you have some sort of handout or something?"

Grrr....

Evan came home and after a while asked me what was wrong. "You know you are just dripping with snappishness, don't you? What are pissed about?"

"Nothing." I asked Andrew to go with me to the store. He knew better than to say no.

We got to the store and I told him that I was sorry. "This really is supposed to be an apology, okay? Not more reprimanding. I realized that the real reason that I was upset was that I was embarrassed by not knowing about it in front of the other mom, and that has more to do with my insecurities than with you."

"I can do a better job of telling you about things. If it is that important to you..."

"Well, I would like you to tell me about things, but what I am saying is that I should let go of caring what other people think of me. I need to remember that not knowing about the band ice cream social doesn't make me a bad mom."

Andrew says, "Just remember you have a license." (Which is what I tell the kids whenever one of them is foolish enough to question me by pointing out that someone else's parents let their kids do something.)

Anyway, we had a companionable time walking through the grocery store. We got to the end and I realized we did not have ice cream so I went down that aisle. We stood there trying to decide and a mom and her daughter walked by. The mother said very loudly, "I'm not spending $5.75 on f***ing hot fudge so that you and your brother can stuff your faces!"

Andrew leaned closed and whispered, "You're a good mom."

Good News for Andrew

It is objectively impossible for him to take all the courses he felt that he should!

Okay, that may seem like a strange thing, but this kid puts a lot of pressure on himself.

He was thinking about three AP classes, plus Marching Band, Jazz Band, Pre-Calc, Economics, and Spanish III. But some of the classes conflict and he has to let one go. And of course there's that thing were there are only seven periods, and that is with the addition of "zero" period.

Interestingly, this seems to make it psychologically possible to consider dropping two classes.

That quiet sound you hear is me sighing with relief.

Although Andrew's more reduced schedule is still a list to make a person gasp.

Frustrated Nesting

Part of the problem is surely that I would rather not do the school work I ought to do.

But part of the problem is that I have a new kid on the way and I want to make the place ready for him.

And I absolutely, positively will not do anything that will make Evan feel like I want him to move out earlier. I don't want him to move out earlier. I wish that Frankie could come two weeks later.

I wish I was going to have a week in between the two boys to prep the room.

The room is an unattractive blue with a strange green trim. Brian picked it out and he loved it and that was really all that mattered. When Evan moved out, Brian moved to the upstairs bedroom (so as to be closer to the puppy). When Evan wanted to move back in he was already part of the family, and it was just temporary. Saying, "Of course you may move back in, but you have to take Brian's old room with the funny colors and the Harry Potter curtains" did not feel rude. Evan was fine with it.

But now there is a new kid coming. I want him to feel welcomed. I want his space to feel like it is really his. You know not "Frankie, Cupboard Under the Stairs, Privet Drive...." or more accurately, "Frankie, Smallest Bedroom with Broken Closet Door and Ugly Paint, Our Street..."

So the plan is to wait until Evan moves out, and then paint -- while the kids are double bunking and school is starting.

Hubby thinks I should just let the painting go until winter break. At the moment I am drifting to the compromise of painting the walls the off white we agreed upon and leave the trim and accent wall until winter. I could paint the walls fairly quickly.

We did buy new window coverings though. At least I will get rid of the old Harry Potter curtains.

This is probably what Evan was worried about when he kept asking me if I could handle the stress of one kid moving in while he was moving out and school was starting.

Hubby is probably right, I should let go of painting it when so much else is going on.

It would be so much easier if it weren't so bloody ugly.

Lessons in Quilting

Over the past fifteen years I have made at least a dozen quilts. I don't consider myself an expert quilter, but I am fairly good. I have just completed my first quilt-as-you-go project and thought I would pass on to you what I have learned.

Quilting as you go is an exciting option. Your initial discovery, like mine, is likely to be that the the loft of the batting creates an interesting variability, resulting in blocks that are significantly different sizes. These however may be paired, sewn together to make adorable throw pillows.

As usual methods of "squaring up blocks" will be impossible, you will also have the opportunity to develop completely new methods of sizing the blocks. You want to produce blocks that are consistent in size, and whose backing extends out further than the block.



Unfortunately, it is extremely difficult to ensure that the block stays square with respect to the backing. Some of your blocks are likely to go askew. Examine the photo below. The right side of the block has been folded over so that you can see that the top of the block extends beyond the backing.


These blocks also make excellent throw pillows.

Since the loft of the backing will be making your block come out smaller than anticipated, it will be tempting to sew with very scant seams. I recommend against this however as the seams may pull a part.


Blocks with this feature do not make good throw pillows. If you are growing low on fabric and patience, you may wish to zigzag, using so called "invisible" thread over some of the weak seams.


When you sew the blocks together requires two seams, the second of which is tricky. See, you have to sew through all the layers and as far as I can figure out, you need to sew it from the back of the quilt. Of course most people will be looking at the top of the quilt. You should therefore attempt to "stitch in the ditch," meaning that you should stitch in the same place as the joining seam on the front. This will be difficult since you cannot see that seam and will have to do it by feel. Just remember though, if the line of sewing must show, it will look reasonably okay if you simply keep the seam line straight. You may need to click on the photo below to see exactly what I mean.




As with any quilt, it is important to trim your blocks to the same size and make consistent seams. Doing this results in a quilt that lays perfectly flat, always an indication of a well-made quilt.